In 3D games, Background Bosses are a rarer occurrence due to the less obvious distinction between "foreground" and "background", but can still apply if the battle is fought at long range and it is (for whatever reason) impossible to actually close distance with the boss.

Due to the impressive difference in scale between these guys and everything else in the game, they are often the Final Boss. As such, beware of minor spoilers in these examples!

Examples:

The Adventures of Lomax has every boss like this. At the end of the first 3 worlds, it's airships shooting rockets at you. At the end of the fourth world, it's Evil Ed who causes bombs and boulders to appear on the stage.

Crabburn from Arc Angle. It's so big that both the game and the player have to zoom out of the screen just to see the thing. There's also the Sleeping Spire of the first stage, who is part of the background in the second half of the level, and Highwayman, a bandit train-thing that attacks you from the background.

Quite a few Mini Bosses and bosses do this too, as well as Xero-Fin in his final attack phase.

In Binary Boy, there is a Skeleton Pirate which shoots cannonballs from the background, and there a Kraken boss in the next level (which doesn't actually attack you, but instead tries to squash you against the bulkheads by forcing the water level to rapidly rise up.

The giant Moai head in Gradius Rebirth. In order to defeat it, you have to destroy the core when it pops out of the head and starts bouncing around, all the while dodging smaller Moai heads and the lightning that generates when the core hits the ceiling or floor.

Heart of Darkness - The Dark Lord in the final chapter. You can't harm him, though, and once you beat the last of his shadowy spawn he politely exits the screen.

General Tor of Iji jumps back and forth from foreground to back, with his most devastating attacks unleashed when he's in the background. He can only be injured when he's in the foreground, though.

Partial examples: Ado from Dream Land 3 and Adeleine from The Crystal Shards. Both characters are artists whose drawings come to life, and most of the battle is actually against previous Kirby boss characters that they summon while they hide behind their easels. Ado/Adeleine only come out to assault Kirby personally at the very end, at which point a single attack defeats them.

Fatty Whale in Kirby Super Star can leap at you from way in the background to create a rising wall of water.

Come to think of it, many of the end-of-planet bosses in Crystal Shards do this (Adeleine is end-of-stage).

Every single boss in Kirby Triple Deluxe spends time in the background for some of their attacks. The final boss in particular remains like this for almost the entirety of the battle, exclusively using Attack Drones (Which are also what you need to attack) to fight you until the last phase.

La-Mulana - one of the last boss villain's slightly more disturbing forms.

Mega Man X and X5 have the last form of Sigma be one of these, with only the head and the two claws being foreground objects. X2 and 3 pit you against similar bosses at the end of the introductory stage, though they're much less of an obstacle.

Rangda Bangda, Sigma's second boss in X1, is the background.

Rangda Bangda is "revived" into a smaller, yet deadlier Boss in X5, and Sigma's One-Winged Angel from the same game is also this; it's one of his largest forms in the series!

Rangda Bangda shows up again in Mega Man Zero 4, although it's a lot smaller and mobile this time. Still in the background though.

Several bosses in the original series were coded as background objects, due to the limitations of the NES graphic engine, but the best example is probably Gamma, the final boss of Mega Man 3. Only the very top of its head was vulnerable (and only to two weapons, and aside from its weak spot and its hands, it didn't inflict Collision Damage.

Mega Man X6 features a background miniboss in Illumina, found in the Weapons Center. You spend much of the level dodging its attacks (and those of the enemies) while trying to reach and destroy two large power cables; destroying the second cable causes Illumina to self-destruct.

Many bosses in the Metal Slug series of games are of this type. Metal Slug 5 had a rather awesome final battle in the form of a gargantuan flying demon wielding a scythe.

In Muramasa: The Demon Blade, the final boss of the standard ending to Momohime's story is a giant statue of the guardian of heaven, Fudo-Myoo. As two lesser deities try to attack you, you must disrupt the barrier protecting various parts of Fudo-Myoo's body by destroying the lesser deities. It's made harder by the fact that large rocks are constantly threatening to crush you and the two deities have some powerful attacks that they will happily unleash upon you.

Ninja Senki - the dragon boss at the end of Scene 8 behaves much like one.

Also in the first Noitu Love, the battle against the enormous Omega Darn. The battle takes place on a helicopter circling around the boss, and to defeat it you must fire super missiles at it while avoiding the rockets, lasers and lightning it shoots at you.

In RosenkreuzStilette Freudenstachel, the first Iris Stage boss is — surprise — Count Michael Zeppelin, who attacks Freudia (and Pamela) from the background and serves as a Breather Boss for That One Level. Oh, and did we mention the fight is similar to Gamma from Mega Man 3?

Seiken Densetsu 3 has Zolan, the werewolf, who is so large he dwarfes the tower which formerly held the mana crystal, his prison. Add to that his impressive claws and absurd special attacks and you can get ready to pack the healing magic out.

The first form of the Death Egg boss for Sonic in Sonic 3 & Knuckles tries to crush you with his mechanical fingers.

Earlier on in the Lava Reef Act 2 boss, Eggman initially behaves this way by launching missiles at you from a distance until you reach the dueling point.

Spawn for the SNES has Malebolgia hanging around in the background, tossing lightning bolts as you fight the real boss, the Mad One. Fortunately, Malebolgia doesn't seem to care much if he hits you or Mad One and will damage him for you if you stay out of the way.

Lil Horn (Also known as the Meat Golem) in Super Meat Boy. Unlike most background bosses, Lil Horn is surprisingly easy: he has the same attack pattern no matter what.

The Z-Master from GaoGaiGar in Super Robot Wars W is laid over the background of the stage. The unit that represents him in battle is placed on the tile that is his eye.

Tails' Nightmare 2 has Tails Doll's final form. To hurt him, you have to fly up to his gem.

The World Ends with You boss Ovis Cantus can barely fit on the screen... and that's just because he's crouching. However, he still swings his arms and fires energy spheres in an attempt to squash the player.

Yoshi's Island: Baby Bowser's amped-up magical form, as shown in the header picture. Unique in that he uses the powers of SuperFX to slowly stomp toward the foreground, looming larger and larger. Also unique in that instead of a Colossus Climb or other attempt to exploit his large geometry, the fight consists of the two of you shelling each other (with actual eggshells, no less) over long background distances. You need to use the shells to knock him back, or else he destroys the platform you're standing on.

In the flash game Project Inthri 3, the boss Nemor has 4 forms. In the third form, he becomes a huge background boss with two phases. The first phase consists of him trying to crush you with his fists, and the second phase has him firing bullets from his eyes and trying trying to hit you with lightning strikes.

Gallagher, the final boss in Super Valis IV, starts off by launching some orbs of plasma at you from the background, before coming to fight you normally.

A very interesting example in Cannon Dancer: while the Final Boss Slaver is actually faced normally sized, there's also a huge image of her in the background and it actually performs the attacks against Kirin. This image is first seen fully, but as Slaver's health depletes, it starts getting closer and closer to the screen until only its angry face covers the whole background.

The Abominable Snowbug would chuck massive snowballs from the background for the first half of the fight, and again when it threw massive snowballs that split into five.

Queen Cadavra would spawn baby spiders from the background, as well as fire at the floor with her eight machine guns, before attempting to body slam Bug.

The bosses in Bully are the Clique leaders. For the Nerds, you do not fight him himself, as he obviously wouldn't be able to hold his own against someone like Jimmy, who has up to that point beaten up three whole cliques (And probably a few prefects if you're lucky enough). Instead, he uses his inventions to get you at range, so the boss fight is actually taking out his inventions to force him to surrender, having no weapons left.

Castlevania: Curse of Darkness Final boss is (surprise surprise) Dracula. His second form tends to stay very far away from your platform and shoots at you. The only way to damage him is to hit him when he slashes at you with his claws.

The castle boss in Donkey Kong 64 is a wooden mockup of K.Rool held behind the castle's parapets. The only way to attack it is by launching your Kongs out of a barrel cannon.

The final boss of Doom 2 could qualify to an extent. Rather than a sprite like other monsters in the game, it actually makes up one of the walls of the last chamber. Its attack method is to fire cubes at pre-determined locations, spawning monsters (which can telefrag you if you're not paying attention). The only way to win was to fire rockets through the small opening in his forehead.

The giant boss battles in Dragon Ball Z Ultimate Tenkaichi function like this. You either have to throw Ki blasts at them when they are far away, or wait for them to do a melee attack so you can attack them directly.

El Shaddai has the Fire Nephilim fought at the end of Chapter 5. Just like a normal Nephilim, but much bigger and much more dangerous. It's so big, Enoch cannot actually defeat it it's eaten by a much bigger Nephilim that used to be one of the Watchers. Luckily, that one's not fought, it's vaporized in a cutscene.

The first time you fight Sin in Final Fantasy X, it's this. The boat that you're on is being dragged behind him by a harpoon in his fin, and it's impossible to touch him except with long range attacks (Wakka, magic, Aeons, etc.).

Goblet Grotto plays with this in the fridge level: once you get to the top, a giant Goblet Man will appear in the background and say "I could do with a chilled toad right about now!", but he doesn't actually attack you. A regular-sized hostile Goblet Man does appear in the fridge, but he goes down as easily as everyone else.

The final boss of Gunstar Heroes and Gunstar Super Heroes qualify, the second more so though as in the first game, The only time in the first game it goes into the background is when it uses the gems as weapons. Said Gems are weakpoints for both final bosses.

The second boss of Jett Rocket, Herzog Aisu, traps you on a narrow platform. You have to do a Ground Pound on the giant flyswatter-type apparatus he attempts to squish you with to defeat him.

The golem in The Legend of Spyro: Dawn of the Dragon is usually fought in this fashion—from his first encounter to his very last, where you have to climb several stories of building in order to finally bring the pain down on his massive hands.

The first Grimnir fight from Magicka. You can see a giant hologram of him while fighting the mages he summons. After that, he fights the player, mano-o-mano.

Technically speaking, in Marvel Ultimate Alliance, at one point, you are going through the Skrull homeworld. Being in space, who should be calmly striding through the background but Galactus. You fight him at the very end of the level, but during it, you have to dodge his attacks and minions.

And in the sequel, Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2, there's the 1 of the 2 Marvel resident Giant-Men (you fight one or the other, depending on who you sided with in the Civil War - going Pro results in you fighting Goliath, a.k.a. Bill Foster, whom the crazy Thor clone killed in the comics, while choosing Anti pits you against Yellowjacket).

The Final Battle in Mass Effect 2 is against a giant incomplete humanoid Reaper who can only be harmed by shooting at one of its four weakspots.

And if you do Grunt's loyalty mission, it ends with a fight against a Thresher Maw, which stays outside the arena and spits acid at you.

In Mass Effect 3, on Rannoch, the quarian homeworld, Shepard discovers that what s/he originally thought was a Reaper base is an actual Reaper. S/he decides to sync up his/her orbital targeting with the entire quarian fleet to blow the Reaper to hell. The fight has the Reaper in the background trying to hit Shepard with its beam while you paint its weak spots for the quarian fleet to hit.

Also in the third game, another Reaper appears during the battle of Earth, guarding the Conduit. It is far in the background, but slowly moves closer. Not long after, Harbinger appears behind the Conduit, where it stays and destroys the entire alliance force. This is also a Scripted Battle.

The Colony Devil Gundam in Gundam vs. Gundam/Next; its only vulnerable portion being the standard-sized torso mounted atop a giant Gundam head with a Breath Weapon. In addition to Beam Spam and throwing out lots of Assist Characters, it borrows from the 2D version of this trope and will occasionally summon gigantic fists to strike the map (though thankfully there is a warning indicator showing precisely where it's going to hit).

In Remember Me, the final boss is large (6-10 meters) and will attack by hitting you with its hands, creating projectiles and summoning other enemies. It is not possible to close distance with him until the finishing cutscene.

In Scaler, the pemiultimate boss fight against Captain Buttbreath, er, Bootlick, er,Bootcamp portrays his lizard-form as a giant Leviathan head in the middle of an acid lake. You're forced to avoid his fireballs, fire breath, and attempts to eat you while occasionally transforming into the acid-spitting Fruzard to shoot his eyes For Massive Damage.

Orjugan in Ys: The Ark of Napishtim. To damage it, you must hit its bombs back or use the flame magic.

Ape Escape 2 has Giant Yellow Monkey. The entire battle is fought on his hands, and you have to wait until he brings you close to his face, at which point he attempts to inhale you, and, if this attack is successfully avoided, becomes open to attack. His weak point is his teeth. Knock all 5 out and you win.

Mega Man X7 features a miniboss in Tornado Tonion's stage that follows you up the tower (he's in the center and you move around the outside of the tower), only his claws and head can hurt you and be hurt. Sigma's final form is an enormous body that's fought in space, with your characters on floating platforms. He teleports around and unleashes several varieties of projectiles both far away and up close, and has a rushing punch attack. X and Axl can shoot him at almost any distance, while Zero has to either reflect certain projectiles or wait till Sigma punches to score hits.

Gruntilda assumes this role for part of the final battle in Banjo-Kazooie, hovering outside the rim of the arena and throwing fireballs at you while you shoot eggs at her in four different spots.

Final Boss Caduceus from Strider 2 is fought in space while Hiryu stands in a small platform in the foreground. It requires Hiryu to do a Colossus Climb through either of its arms to reach its weak point, the head.

The 2014 Strider features two such bosses as well: The Hover Tank "Tornado" remains always in the background as it peppers Hiryu with projectiles, becoming vulnerable only when it tries to ram him; and the Final BossMeio Prime works in much the same way as Caduceus did, sans Colossus Climb.

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